Water Rocket Forum

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A water rocket is a type of model rocket using water as its reaction mass. The pressure vessel (the engine of the rocket) is constructed from thin plastic or other non metallic materials (usually a used plastic soft drink bottle) weighing 1,500 grams or less. The water is forced out by compressed air. It is an example of Newton's third law of motion.

Teamdbrockets wrote:Thnx!
and no there was no strong wind!
the camera was taped at the outside of the rocket .
the weight of the camera is the problem.
but there was no parachute needed.
the rocket goes horizontal down.

Ah yes, I see. So the Clifford Heath simulator probably expects all the weight to be on the centre line of the rocket. It may give you a higher estimated altitude than you achieved in practice. A lovely flight, though!

The rocket rolls quite a lot on the way down. Are you worried that the camera will roll to the bottom just before impact, and perhaps be damaged?

Teamdbrockets wrote:Thnx!
and no there was no strong wind!
the camera was taped at the outside of the rocket .
the weight of the camera is the problem.
but there was no parachute needed.
the rocket goes horizontal down.

We call that type of recovery a "side glider" We used that recovery system on our X-4, X-5 and X-6 rockets. The drawback that we discovered with that system is that the rocket spins on the way down. In your video the rocket does the same thing producing a "sky-ground-sky-ground" view. This would ruin any video that was taken. (back in 2003 the cameras were not as powerful) and were slower to adjust to light and dark conditions which would cause the camera to "get behind" with the light and dark adjustments (it would adjust to the darkness of the ground just in time to look at the bright sky and vice versa). We also had problems with the local wind currents destabilizing the side gliding rocket and sending it into a nosedive.